The monster in me
by Spock99
Summary: Remus practices Glamours and transfiguration. What happens when Sirius walks in on him? AU where Sirius and Remus both are alive and free after the war.


**A/N **

**Written fort QLFC, Chaser 1 of Falmouth Falcons, Season 7, round 6**

**Prompts: Cross dressing: write about someone dressing up as another gender**

**wordcount 1616**

**(colour) mustard**

**(emotion) disappointment**

**Warning: mentioning of corporal punishment; no detailed description, though**

* * *

I'm standing in front of my mirror, wearing only my boxers. I am looking at my body from head to toe, and I don't like what I see. Whenever I look at myself, I am disappointed. Not because of who I am, but because of what I look like. Like a pale, skinny guy with no hair on his chest, not much muscle and scars all over his body. As a kid, I liked to imagine how my life would have been if I were a different person. Would I have been happier? Would I have seen more of the world? Would I even still be alive?

But then my imagination wasn't enough anymore. I needed more. In my third year at Hogwarts, I read up on glamours and part-transfigurations with short-lasting effect. When I was at home, alone in my room, I practiced. I never knew why my magic wasn't detected, and I still can't explain it to this day.

At first, it started with changing my hair color for a few moments. After that, I learned how to apply the glamours more precisely to smaller parts of my body. I made the scars disappear, tried to tan my skin a bit, and tried a more muscular form of myself. This went on and on until I finally was perfect with glamours and human body transfiguration. I even tried some small things to last longer, to see if they might affect my life. I discovered I felt lighter without the scars on my torso. Even if nobody ever saw them, I knew they weren't visible, and that made it easier for me to carry them around.

The first time I tried to make myself taller was when I was sixteen. Before that, I couldn't bring up the courage, because I had read a lot about those spells going wrong. I liked how I looked after I succeeded with that. It was still me, but I looked stronger.

Once my mother came in when I was practicing, but she didn't see the five centimeters from the door. She just told me dinner would be ready soon and left. I was scared she had noticed something, but she never said a thing. Perhaps she knew, but she didn't tell Father and she certainly didn't ask me. For that I'm grateful.

One of the worst days of my life was when Father walked in on me, wearing a dress. I had just transfigured my shirt into one, just to see how it looked. A glamour on my hair made it seem longer than it actually was. I hadn't meant to look—feminine. I was just looking for possible changes. For things to make me…more comfortable, more like myself? I can't explain why I did that stuff over such a long time.

That very day Father walked in on me was the only time he beat me. He stood there, frozen to the spot, staring at my appearance with his eyes full of shock. I slowly turned around and looked at him. The expression on his face was strange. Sad and disappointed and cold and angry all at once. I tried to explain but no words came out of my mouth, and suddenly, he came over and slapped me hard.

When I looked at him again, he grabbed me by the neck and brought me down into the basement. To the room where the cage was. He caned me, yelling that I was a boy and had to act like one. Not even being a monster would make such behavior acceptable. This day taught me two things. First: Lock the door when practicing. Second: My own father thinks of me as a monster. That was like a stab to the heart.

I force myself out of my thoughts and stare at the mirror again. I'm an adult now. There are more scars on my body than in my youth. I look tired and thin. Sighing deeply, I throw on a shirt and start my routine. I still practice glamours every now and then. It's relaxing. First, I make the nasty scars disappear from my face.

I hungrily look at the smooth, pale skin on my cheeks and a small smile appears. For once it isn't deformed by the scars. Their absence makes my features softer; freshly shaved like I am right now, it almost looks feminine. My father's disappointed face comes to my mind but I push it back.

I am an adult and he won't dictate what I do in my rooms, alone with my imagination. It isn't illegal to dress up, is it?

Next, I make my hair darker. The grey streaks are gone and make me look younger. I raise my eyebrows with a short time glamour and make my lips a touch bigger. Then a faint bit of color is added to my skin, to make me look healthier.

Out of impulse, I transfigure my shirt into a dress. It is a mustard. The color of cheerfulness and warmth. Warmth like a person who loves you. I wish someone would love me like I never have. It is not that I do not like my body. I am okay with it. It is just that it looks so battered. To really love oneself is reserved for others.

I wave my wand again and see the dark brown hair grow longer until it falls onto my shoulders. Now I really look like a woman. A quite masculine one, but a woman. I slowly turn my body and stare at my flat chest for a moment before I decide to leave it like it is. I rotate faster and faster until the hem of the dress is flying around me. I spread my arms and close my eyes.

I imagine how a female version of myself would look like during the full moon, and giggle like a child at the thought of lipstick on a werewolf. I am dizzy when I finally stop spinning. The room is still rotating but I face the mirror again and look at myself. My cheeks sport slight pink spots.

Then, with a loud bang, the door to my bedroom is opened. I see Sirius standing in the entrance with a huge smile on his face, his hair disheveled from running, and his eyes sparkling with happiness. The moment he sees me, his expression changes. With rising fear in my stomach, I watch him walk across the room and stop behind me. He stares at our reflection in the mirror. My chest is suddenly tight. My breath is flat, and I struggle to find the right words to explain this to him, but everything I manage is a choked "Sirius…"

His eyes find mine in the mirror, and he looks at me with a seriousness he seldom displays. Then he raises his hand and gently, almost lovingly, secures a bit of my long hair behind my right ear. I shudder at his touch and avoid his gaze. The heat rises to my face.

"Why?" he asks. The single word cuts the silence surrounding us. But it isn't violently spoken, the sound is more like a soft whisper. Meant to inquire, not to accuse or hurt. I raise my eyes, see the tears in them as I investigate the mirror.

"I'm sorry," I whisper. Before I can lower my head again, I feel his hand snake under my chin, holding it up.

"Don't be," he says, and his eyes still ask me why I am doing this. I cross my arms tightly around my torso; I can't tell whether it is to give me some comfort or to hold myself together.

"I… I sometimes try things." My voice is quiet, almost too quiet to hear at all. "How I could look without the wolf." I lower my head in shame and wait for the cruel words to fall from my friend's lips. But they never come. Instead, I feel his arms around my body, pulling me close. I let myself fall into his embrace and suddenly the tears fall. Tears I have never cried in all those years. Tears I find too humiliating to cry.

"You are beautiful the way you are, Moony," he whispers into my ear, and I start to tremble. After some minutes he pulls away and brings out his wand.

His eyes search my face for something, but they don't seem to find it. He raises his wand and asks, "May I?"

I feel my head nod. And one by one he cancels the glamours on my body. With each one he strips off me, I feel more vulnerable, yet the longer he continues, the lighter I feel. I don't know why but I want to think of it as a good thing. Seconds later, I stand before him as the battered, tired man I am. I am still hugging my middle, still trembling like a leaf. I know the scars are back again. All of them. The carefully hidden ones, the sloppily masked one, and the ones that cross my face.

The scars that mark me as the monster I am. Once again, I find myself in Sirius' embrace. It feels so warm, so loving, so good. Like home. Like acceptance. I raise my head and look into his eyes. He traces his right index finger along the nasty scars on my face and smiles softly.

"I love them all. They make you the man I love." With that, he pulls me close again, and I throw my arms around him, holding onto him tightly. Just for a moment, perhaps, but gone is the fear, the disappointment, the doubts.


End file.
